Topol sexual harassment suits settled

Terms are confidential A settlement was reached last week in three sexual harassment suits filed by a former University student who was romantically involved with one of her professors. The student, Lisa Topol, accused former Assistant English Professor Malcolm Woodfield of harassment after their three-month affair ended in the spring of 1993. Terms of the settlement are confidential, according to University General Counsel Shelley Green. "The parties have agreed to resolve their differences," Green said. "This ends the process -- all of the litigation." Topol's attorney, Alice Ballard, confirmed that no further action is expected on any of her client's complaints. In March 1994, Topol filed suit against the University, charging that administrators had failed to resolve her harassment complaint in a timely manner. Proceedings in that case were expected to begin in federal district court last month. Topol also had suits pending against Woodfield in Philadelphia Common Pleas Court and against Bates College in Maine, where Woodfield taught for two years before coming to the University. She contended that Bates withheld information about Woodfield's conduct there -- including allegations of sexual harassment leveled by students there. Woodfield resigned in April 1994, after admitting that he had had sex with Topol while she was a student in his class, making their relationship in violation of the University's sexual harassment policy. In March of this year, U.S. District Court Judge Anita Brody ruled during the pre-trial discovery period that Topol would have to turn over as evidence the diary she kept during her involvement with Woodfield. The University believed the contents of Topol's diary would discredit her claims of harassment and prove that her relationship with Woodfield had been consensual. During the spring of 1993, Topol had shared some of the diary with then-Ombudsman Daniel Perlmutter and Assistant Ombudsman Gulbun O'Connor. Ballard contested the University's motion to gain access to the diary, claiming that since Topol had been advised to record her thoughts by Penn Women's Center personnel, the patient-psychotherapist privilege protected any information the book contained. But Ballard said earlier this week that the University did not get to view the diary after all. The Woodfield-Topol case, with its conflicting allegations of illicit sex and abuse of power, has become somewhat of a cause cZlebrZ in the media. It spawned a lengthy feature in Philadelphia magazine last fall and was one of the focal stories in a Time magazine piece about student-professor relationships last month. Additionally, as a result of fallout from the case, the University's Faculty Senate recently approved a draft policy forbidding all sexual relationships between students and faculty members.

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